


the blurry impression of you

by bothromeoandjuliet



Category: The Queen's Gambit (TV)
Genre: Age Difference, Angst, Chess, Emotional Infidelity, F/M, I Blame Tumblr, I Wrote This Instead of Sleeping, I'm just overly invested in them blurring Beth whenever Borgov looked at her, Repression, Right?, So Much Chess, Symbolism, The Author Regrets Nothing, Unresolved Emotional Tension, Unresolved Romantic Tension, Unresolved Sexual Tension, everything is unresolved really, it has to mean SOMETHING, my blundering attempts at being profond
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-15
Updated: 2020-12-15
Packaged: 2021-03-10 21:33:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,437
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28083978
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bothromeoandjuliet/pseuds/bothromeoandjuliet
Summary: ‘Liza Harmon.’ Borgov thinks, ‘My Liza.’A Bethov fic, in which Vasily Borgov overthinks and Beth Harmon rises to the top.
Relationships: Vasily Borgov & Beth Harmon, Vasily Borgov & Luchenko, Vasily Borgov/Beth Harmon
Comments: 26
Kudos: 215





	the blurry impression of you

**Author's Note:**

  * For [thefudge](https://archiveofourown.org/users/thefudge/gifts).



> I'm gifting this fic to @thefudge because I wouldn't have even watched The Queen's Gambit if she hadn't reblogged gifsets of these two and set my shipper senses tingling - so if this makes you cringe from over pretiensious-ness just know that it's her fault. 
> 
> (Seriously though, @thefudge, thank you for introducing me to these two - it felt like a breath of fresh air trying to write for a new ship <3)
> 
> I also made a video edit for these two, which you can find here: https://youtu.be/TGPNAm3aRJI

The first time he sees her, it’s from behind, with droplets of water running down her plastic hood, shining against her flaming hair. It’s only half a second, maybe less—they don’t even make eye contact—but he feels her stare on him all the same.

He turns back to face the gorilla in it’s inclosure, (he won’t call it a prison; an entrapment, he’s far too aware of his own situation to bestow those expressions on anyone or anything else,) but instead of the black animal and it’s nonchalant slump, all Borgov can see is his own reflection in the glass, staring back at him with those sullen eyes that he is usually so careful to avoid. He doesn’t shy away from them though—he’d rather face himself then turn once more to see if she is giving him a final fleeting glance.

* * *

The other players mention her from time to time, in-between matches or drinks in the hotel bar. They say she is a terrifying opponent to face—a genius hidden behind well tailored clothes and too large eyes. Borgov gives them his ear, not bothering to mention that he could give them all the answers they could possibly want regarding her backstory. The Russian government does not leaves stones unturned; he’d read her history in the back of the car on the way from the airport. He still has the folder in his briefcase—it was only a few pages long.

* * *

A week into the tournament he feels her stare on him again, only this time he doesn’t look up. Bilek, his opponent, isn’t a difficult defeat by any stretch of the imagination, but Borgov refuses to let himself acknowledge anything besides the board and the pieces. He has already spent more then enough of his time this week considering this strangely enigmatic orphan girl. Let her look if she likes—he’s certain she won’t find whatever it is that she’s searching for.

A moment later her footsteps fade away and the heaviness retreats. His mind regains the slight amount of clarity she had momentarily possessed, and he wins the game in four moves.

* * *

The next morning he sees her from behind again, sitting at her table—waiting for her newest challenger to arrive. Her head begins to turn towards him as he passes, the orange strands sparking in the early morning sunlight, and they dance around one another once more—with her gaze landing on him just a millisecond after he has torn his own away from her.

* * *

“There’s talk she’s a drunk. Her game is almost all attack,” one of the agents tell him after they enter the elevator a few days later, “so she doesn’t always watch her back. When she blunders, she gets angry, and can be dangerous.”

“Like all woman…” the other agent joins in, further solidifying himself as a pawn piece in Bolgov’s mind.

These agents they send with him, they are always the same—they have enough knowledge of the game to be worth talking to occasionally, but they have no grasp of subtlety; of human nature. He’d re-read the Harmon file the night before, and again during his breakfast, and when he speaks it is with the calmness of conviction.

“She’s an orphan. A surviver. She is like us—losing is not an option for her. Otherwise,” and there that heat is again, burning into the nape of his neck; up across the curvature of his skull, “what would her life be.”

There is silence after he speaks, and he takes the moment before the elevator dings and the doors slide open to look over his shoulder towards her; to finally see the face that has been described to him so many times—but the girl shifts as he turns, leaving him with only the blurry impression of her profile; of the firmly parted hair, the smooth arch of her cheekbone.

It is a disconcerting image, and when the doors finally open Borgov leads the way through them with a haste he cannot explain.

* * *

He manages to resettle himself by the time their game begins, stretching out to take her slender hand in a firm shake, but that doesn’t mean he can see her any clearer. All she is, this Beth Harmon from America, is a human personification of fear. All Borgov can see is the trembling fingertips—the rage filled eyes with that stare that jerks so sharply from one place to another.

Behind him a camera clicks, it’s flash illuminating the angles of her face and she jerks. The very next instant the man is being ushered out by the moderators but it is too late, Borgov has already read her movement for what it is, the movement of prey; and he moves in for the kill.

Her elbows press hard against the table, reddening—and when she finally knocks over her King it is with a sigh of defeat.

* * *

Later that day the whispers tell him that she discovered her mother’s body when returning to her room after the match. It reminds Borgov of his father’s passing, even though she's older and stronger and more used to life's hard knocks then he was at that age. He wonders what she looks like—wonders if tears and fatigue would fill in the gaps of her that he seems to keep missing out on. He almost thinks about going to her, offering his assistance; but no—Beth Harmon is his competition, and the fact that she is seventeen, grieving, and alone in a strange place does not change that.

It’s not until he’s riding the elevator down to the lobby of the hotel that he finally decides that there wouldn’t have been tears anyway.

* * *

He’s looking forward to Paris. Normally the Paris tournament is his least favorite—the French are so focused on creating a spectacle; everything is open air and light colors. It makes him feel heavy, and dull, and the ever-changing group of reporters continue to grow younger and younger, making Borgov feel his age in a particularly unpleasant way.

But this year will be different; this year _she_ will be there with him. Two years, since they last sat across a board from one another, and he knows that she will have learned much in that time. Instead of a child there will be a woman, a woman capable of beating him—capable of finally taking her rightful place, next to him at the top of the ladder.

He can’t truly say that he has felt excited about a tournament in years, but he is excited for Paris.

* * *

The first thing he notices is that her hair is longer—the red locks hovering just past her chin. The second thing he notices is the absence of her heated gaze resting on him. True, her limbs do not move until they are called to sit before the press; but her eyes refuse to focus—they are here, there, always darting away from him—searching for an escape.

* * *

The reporters interview the other, less important players first, before interviewing him—interviewing her. Borgov wonders if she realizes why; if she knows that her untempered flight to meet him and defeat him has become an international affair. The world, and he himself with it, are waiting with baited breath to see who shall be the one to fall from grace; the grandmaster or the rising star.

“Mr. Borgov, what’s it like to complete with younger players, and how much longer do you think you’ll play?”

He feels himself grimace as he answers the question; wishes that the questions would end and the playing would begin, but answers as steadfastly as he can all the same.

“I feel good, I feel as good as I felt when I was four years old and played my first game. Chess still excites me the same way."

Cameras flash as he speaks, and warmth begins to spread over his left cheek as he continues,

“I have no plans to stop playing, and I’ll likely die with my head on a chessboard.”

His words are translated without a fuss, and the assembled reporters laugh before moving on—leaving him to direct his attention to the slight groove that someone before him had dug into the shining varnish of the wooden desk. He can hear her speak, and the crowd laughs again.

‘ _Good._ ’ he thinks, ‘ _Let her charm the public, she will need to._ ’

“Miss. Harmon,” one of the quieter, more respectful reporters near the front breaks in, “do you feel good about a rematch with Grandmaster Borgov?”

The question catches his attention, and Borgov listens carefully for any sign of fear in her response, but the words flow easily from her; as if she had rehearsed them in her head before hand. Very likely she had, and it amuses him to picture her on the plane—going over her words to perfect them, to appear prepared.

“Very good. I slept on the plane, so I arrived in Paris with no jet lag. I’m very well rested. At night, I stay in my room, and study Mr. Borgov’s old games.”

“Including the one against you in Mexico City?”

The question announces it’s presence like a bomb, and a hush settles over the room as they all await her answer. She pauses, letting the cameras flash, their lights illuminating the bones of her face as she considers her answer—and when she speaks it is in his own language—the sound of his mother tongue in her mouth shooting through him like lightening.

“Especially that one.”

He cannot help himself when he looks over at her and then away, allowing a satisfied smile to settle over his face for the briefest of moments. Answering in Russian is the only way she can send him her unspoken message—‘ _I am coming for you._ ’—and Borgov has never been more pleased.

* * *

They play at parallel tables throughout the tournament, ensuring that he never catches more then a hazy, fleeting glimpse of her profile. She is out of his reach, but every day—every fresh opponent that they defeat—brings them closer together.

Occasionally he knows she is looking at him during her latest victims turn, and more often then that he casts his eye over her play boards—learning her temperament through her plays. One day, after he returns to his seat to fetch his notations, he thinks that the scent of her perfume is gracing the air around his chair, but that he chocks up to an overactive imagination.

For the most part, however, he is kept to his rooms, or to the general public sites. The Louve, the Eiffel Tower—and over and over again he is informed that Paris is the city of lovers; the city of romance. At first he brushes this aside, but when he is told what he already knows, that in the morning he and Beth Harmon will finally play one another as they always should have—as equals—he changes his mind.

There is, Borgov must admit, a certain romance here—the forced intimacy of the game they will play tomorrow. Her, the board, and him; with the entire word watching to see who will be bested.

* * *

He arrives on time to the match. There’s a flurry of mechanical clicks as he enters; blinding flashes of lightbulbs. He is told where to sit and that he will be playing black—his family and the agents settle into their seats behind him. The large clock on the wall ticks on, and he waits, his every nerve exposed and prepared for game that is about to be played. Borgov thinks that this match will be historic, and he is honored that he will have a front row seat to see it play out.

* * *

Fifteen minutes later they send someone to her room to fetch her—and another ten minutes after that the door finally flies open to the sound of the cameras and relieved murmurs. Her steps slow as she approaches the table—like she is trying to delay what has already begun—but he doesn’t look up from the board until she has come to a stop before him. Then he looks up, letting his eyes wander up, then down, then up again, taking in her limp hair and too pale face.

It is a shock to him to see her like this—so obviously opposite to the controlled woman she has been during the past few days. Borgov can smell the stale scent of alcohol on her; the scent of sweat.

“I’m sorry.” she murmurs, her voice low and raspy.

Everyone around them has fallen into a hush, waiting to see his reaction, waiting to catch whatever happens next. Borgov can almost hear the reporters thoughts whirling—spinning unpleasant headlines, and falsely concocted tales of disgust and scandal—and in the half-second that exists between his stare landing on her trembling lips and him standing up to take her hand in a firm shake—he decides that it will not be aided by him in any way if he can help it.

She returns his handshake limply, and he gestures for her to sit, which she does with a slight heaving of her chest—her breath coming out in panting bursts, and so the game begins.

* * *

He had at first thought that she might be able to turn the match around, but as the game progresses and pitcher after pitcher of water is consumed on her side of the table he begins to lose hope. She is playing like a drowning man; making foolish moves and dragging, rather then moving, her pieces across the board.

He does not look at the board as he plays—the only thing he can keep his eyes on is her; what he can see of her at least. She keeps her head down, her fingers kneading the top bone of her spine restlessly. The fire red of her hair gleams dully as her hands run though it—rook sliding across the board—and another pitcher of water is brought.

The movement of her rook clears the path to his victory, and rage boils inside him as he takes it. ‘ _This,_ ’ he thinks, ‘ _is not what was supposed to happen. This was meant to be a triumph._ ’

It is only after he has made that final, deadly move, that she looks up into his face—eyelids fluttering in shock. He wants to cry out that this is her fault—that she left him with no choice—but as soon as he has caught her gaze she looks down again, biting her lip.

She should have beaten him and they both know it, so he really isn’t very surprised when she closes her eyes and a tear slides out from between eyeliner smudged eyelids.

“I resign.”

The words are said clearly, without a tremor to betray herself.

She walks away before he can shake her hand.

* * *

He spends the next year trying not to think about her—trying to ignore her existence as his peers and fellow players seem to have done. After Paris, after her match against Borgov, the ‘American girl’ is no longer deemed a threat—and only threats are kept track of; reported on. Borgov, however, still has her file from Mexico City and it becomes a nightly routine for him to flip through it in his office after dinner—away from prying eyes—his fingertips catching on the newspaper cuttings and magazine articles he had collected between then and Paris. Tales of triumph after triumph, of rising steadily through the ranks—until Paris, until him.

Borgov has taken a decided dislike to Paris once more; even the vaguest thought of the city gives him a bad taste in his mouth—like a tooth is rotting beneath his tongue, like he is decaying from the inside out—and at night he dreams of red curls and blurry silhouettes.

* * *

It is Luchenko who speaks to Borgov about her in the end. He no longer tours the tournament circuit, but he has grown interested in Beth Harmon despite that fact—has quizzed Borgov about her on multiple occasions—so it really isn’t very surprising that he is the first to discover that she is coming to Moscow, and if Borgov is disappointed that he was not alone when he first heard the news it doesn’t show on his face.

“I had thought, perhaps, that she had stopped playing.”

Borgov responds with a grunt, his mind torn between relief and something he tries not to look at too closely. Relief that she is alive, relief that in a few short weeks he will once again see her face to face—soul to soul—will have the opportunity to make a complete picture of her in his mind rather then the fuzzy, washed out image he has had to make do with since he met her.

“You are not pleased to be playing her once more?” Luchenko inquires, his stare far too intelligent behind his glasses as he stares his former student down.

Borgov moves uneasily, refilling his still partially full glass, before shrugging the question away.

“I do not know that I will be playing her yet. She may be beaten before it comes to that.”

Luchenko chuckles in agreement, but deep down Borgov knows that Luchenko thinks the same as he does—that there is only one man who has a chance at halting Beth Harmon’s rise to the top, and that that man is Borgov himself.

* * *

He first sees her again in the reception hall of the Mockba Hotel—a few blocks from where the tournament is being held—where all the players have been gathered to live together under one roof, like one big, happy family.

Borgov does not speak to her and their stares—sitting parallel to one another with Luchenko between them—do not cross paths; but from the corner of his eye he can see that her hair is once again longer, curling up and away from her shoulders like an upside-down flower. It is redder then in his dreams.

She looks calm, collected—but she had looked calm and collected in Paris as well, and look where that had led them. ‘ _But this is not Paris._ ’ he reminds himself, ‘ _Here, in Moscow, things will be different._ ’

* * *

Chess in Russia is a lavish affair; to an extent that Borgov himself had not quiet realized until he is seated at an angle behind her, watching his world through her eyes. They are being treated to a orchestral performance after tea, and all the players are sitting staggered around one another—pretending that there is no competition looming in their shared futures.

From behind, through her hair, he can see her cheek lift into a smile as she watches the performers, who must—he realizes with a shock—be almost the same age as she was when she entered her first competition. Perhaps, it is that she sees herself echoed in their faces, or in the hungry passion in their eyes, but Borgov prays that she does not. It is a passion born out of the need for success for these children, but for her, he hopes, it had been a passion born out of love.

They are the last two to leave their seats after the music has ended and the stage lights have been dimmed. He wants to tell her that he is pleased to see her—that he has looked forward to seeing her since that cloudy morning in Paris a year ago—but he hasn’t felt the heat of her gaze on his face once, and the American government has sent some bumbling agent along with her who will surely be displeased to have his charge spoken to by Borgov, so he holds his tongue and turns coldly away when she exits out into the hallway just seconds after he does.

* * *

They begin the competition on opposite sides of the long room, her on the right and him on the left. His clock is started first, and hers is started last, but she wins her match in twenty-seven moves—a long hour before he has pinned his own opponent into a corner.

The room claps for her and Borgov does not look up as she strides by.

* * *

That night there is a dinner held at the hotel for the players, where they are invited to sit in a cozy, brightly lit room and talk and laugh and feast to their hearts content. As Grandmaster, he is given a place of consideration at the head of the table—as an interloper and an outsider, Beth Harmon is placed near to the foot, surrounded by players she has not yet faced.

Most of the conversation is in Russian, not that that will be an issue for her if she has kept up her lessons since Paris, but she does not speak much. Instead, she watches the surrounding faces—collects the specimens that have been so carefully gathered to be presented to her. He wishes he were nearer to her, wishes that he could sit beside her and clatter his utensils against his plate just for the sheer pleasure of feeling her jump in her seat.  
But Vasily Borgov isn’t sitting next to Beth Harmon, and so he is forced to settle for feeling her eyes watching him and then falling away, again and again and again throughout the evening.

* * *

During his match with Hellstrom he gives in, for a moment; rising from his still-ongoing game almost as soon as she has walked past him after finishing her own.

Borgov steps onto the very floorboards her feet have just crossed—striding through the lingering scent of the perfume she has left behind—and stands over her game, cementing it in his memory. There are confused mutterings in the crowd, and Hellstrom has thrown up his hands in frustration, but Borgov ignores them all, his gaze transfixed by the board.

The warmth of her gaze creeps over him, and he holds his hand to his face to hide his trembling lips until she has ceased watching him and her footsteps have faded away into the pounding of his head.

* * *

“They say she wanders in the streets—taking in the sights.” Luchenko tells him over a cigar the next night—smoke filling the air with a hazy persistence.

A pause, and Borgov stares into his reflection in the glass; digs his teeth hard into the inside of his cheek.

“There is no crime against it.” he answers at last, and Luchenko laughs.

“I never said there was—my only wish is to make conversation, which has become increasingly difficult with you of late, my old friend.”

“I do not believe I would have ever been called a talkative man.” he responds, leaning forward to place his glass precisely in the center of the coaster sitting in front of him.

He doesn’t feel like talking anymore, doesn’t feel like drinking. The implication—the question—is clear in Luchenko’s voice; and unfortunately the older man doesn’t seem to want to take the hint.

“Talkative, no, but it is a rarity to hear as silent as you have been these past few days.”

“It is merely the tournament, it preoccupies me.”

Another cloud of smoke rises up into the air. It chokes him, makes him want to fling open a window and throw himself through it onto the pavement below—he would be willing to go anywhere, do anything, to escape the piercing scrutiny of the former champion’s eyes.

“Perhaps.” Luchenko concedes, “but I have only known you this preoccupied once before. About a year ago, I believe it was, after your return from the Paris tournament? You were so withdrawn when you first arrived home; so distant. I worried about you—worried that you were unwell—but seeing you as you are now, perhaps—“

“Perhaps, what exactly, Lev?” Borgov interrupts angrily, squirming restlessly in his seat, digging his nails into the middle of his palm.

Luchenko smiles calmly at him—the picture of innocence—and shrugs as he replies,

“Well, perhaps you were merely preoccupied.”

* * *

The next day he and Luchenko face one another—their match a pleasurable break from Borgov’s earlier games. They both know who will win, but it is amusing to play at fierce rivals for the surrounding audience.

She sits at the next table, beating Hellstrom soundly by the middle game; and Borgov has to hold his breath to keep from laughing as the affronted man storms off, leaving her hand extended towards nothing.

Another day, another table removed—bringing him closer to her. She defeats Shapkin easily, receiving a reaction quite different from Hellstrom’s tantrum when Shapkin bends down to her, dragging his lips across her knuckles in an admission of complete and total surrender.

Borgov does not find as much humor in that reaction.

* * *

He doesn’t think that it is obvious, his eyes watching her. His playing remains cool and unaffected—as if he is completely undisturbed by the upcoming challenger; as if he is not being haunted by hazy apparitions of her around every corner, inside every dream.

Borgov knows that the government will have tried to trip her up by this point—will have tempted her in one way or another—but he sees no sign of her having given in. It strengthens him to see it; to see further proof that this is not like Paris—that she will not fall short this time.

* * *

Luchenko asks Borgov to his room the night of his and Beth Harmon’s adjournment. He goes gladly, grateful for the opportunity to study her games with a real purpose instead of his mere idle curiosity. He is the last to arrive and, at Luchenko’s request, leaves the door open behind him to help circulate the air; to stimulate the stale tactics that will doubtlessly hold no weight against her tomorrow.

No-one, not even Borgov himself, is quite certain what move she placed inside the envelope. His best guess is the pawn, and he says so—but if his voice is slightly too quiet to be taken notice of he won’t be held accountable for it.

The pieces shift back and forth across the board as they move through every possible combination; slowly, methodically. It’s intoxicating, playing in her shoes—saying her name with a reckless abandon—Borgov can almost feel her eyes on him, peering into his soul. The feeling makes him move faster, breath harder, reaching for the engraved bottle of vodka to fill his glass and hopefully clear his head, but as he does so the feeling intensifies—burning him.

He lifts his gaze as he lifts the bottle away from his glass, just managing to catch her in the act of turning away; blurring out of focus once more. Luchenko and Shapkin do not notice him tilting his head as he stares through the doorway, watching her walk back to what Borgov now knows is her room—and when she finally disappears from view Borgov strides over to the door, shutting it; closing himself in—shutting her out.

Then the other two men look at him, confused, but all he has to offer them is a shrug; a gesturing of hands, and a feeble explanation.

“There was a draft."

* * *

The next day she hides her face with her hand, sinking beneath green velvet. He stares at her long and hard, but the lights are too bright on her face and his seat is too near the entrance for him to capture any more of her then he has managed to before. He wishes he could walk up to her and ask what she was thinking when she stood there in the doorway the night before—so near to him and yet so far away; watching him and his fellow Russians try to impersonate her—watching him try to learn her through the movements of wooden pieces on a board.

The skin on his knuckles turns white when he pulls out his chair.

Behind him he can hear the delicate thudding of the pieces—the rasping of fabric against fabric—and Luchenko’s sigh; heavy and impressive in the dead air that is surrounding them all. His own game moves smoothly. Borgov’s moves are automatic, a mere reaction to his opponent’s.

A low murmur comes from the table behind him—the clock stopping with a deadening click. Luchenko is speaking to her, and she is speaking back and then, and then, she laughs, the sound sending a jolt through him.

This hall, this game, is not a laughing matter—Borgov was taught that from his very first match. Chess, is sacred, a game of the mind, not of the body; and it is to be respected as nothing else is.

Behind him Beth Harmon laughs once more.

* * *

The length of her match with Flento the next day is a surprise. He had not expected that, and is relieved when the clapping begins—signaling that Flento has resigned; signaling that tomorrow is the day that Borgov will once again face Beth Harmon across the brown and cream squares. It redoubles his energy in his own game, and he wins a mere half-hour after she does.

* * *

The audience begins to rustle in excitement when she enters the hall, her stare heavy on the back of his head—her heels tapping steadily along the floor as she walks to him. He does not allow himself to turn and look at her; instead keeping his eyes still on the table until she has come to a stop at the opposite side of the table, staring down at him defiantly, and Borgov looks up into her face, smirking slightly. 

He stands, his movements jerky as if he is a puppet and she his marionette, and Borgov’s hand tightens when it takes hers, resisting the urge to pull her out from the shadows she is hiding in—to draw her out into the pool of lamplight where he is standing.

The handshake lasts longer then it should—with his thumb dragging across the skin on the backs of her fingers—and by the time he releases her hand the wide eyes have gotten even wider; eyelashes flaring up to the eyebrows.

Clapping fills the room as they sit at last, and the moderator starts her clock without hesitation, as if this is not the most important game in Borgov’s life. Pawn moves to d-four, the queen’s gambit. He allows himself a small twitch of the lips, and the game begins.

* * *

The game goes on for hours—the room and people surrounding them falling farther and farther away with each piece that is moved. Knights and bishops fly under their fingers—the time between each clicking of the clock becoming shorter and shorter—and Borgov falls back into his mind, keeping his stare on the squares before him; on her slender white hands moving among the pieces with such ease. His pen scratches out notations that he has already memorized; movements that he knows he will go over again when he returns to his room that night.

Pawn moves to h-three.

Borgov looks up at her then, tightens his jaw, then forces it to relax, and Beth Harmon stares back at him with her black lined eyes.

“Adjourn.”

Borgov is not a talkative man, and the english language is not—will never be—his strong suit. But Liza, (Beth, he chides himself, always Beth and nothing more,) has taken the time to learn his language both on and off the board—the least he can do is show her the same respect.

She watches as the monitor hands him his envelope; her stare burning into him as he writes down his next move. Borgov wants to take her hand as he stands, wants to carry her away with him, but he restrains himself—walks away from her with his stride steady and his back straight.

Her gaze stays on him until he disappears.

* * *

He doubles back before he has reached his waiting taxi—retracing his steps as quickly as he can. He doesn’t know what he’s doing, only that he cannot go another night without having congratulated her on having come this far; having overcome so much. His breath comes fast and his heart is beating loudly, too loudly for the simple thing he is preparing to do.

He turns the corner just as the cameras begin to flash, their lights illuminating the young pair—the head of dark hair laying so naturally atop Beth Harmon’s red curls. They rock back and forth, bodies pressed close and arms entangled. Borgov’s jaw tightens as the man’s chin settles into the hollow between her neck and shoulder, and the cameras begin to fade away—the novelty wearing off.

He is gone before she and the man separate.

* * *

The match continues at five p.m the next day—long after the Russian sun has disappeared, leaving the sky dark and the streets cold. Borgov arrives first, gives himself time to prepare and to settle the sense of nervousness that has crept under his skin as the day had progressed. Luchenko, Flento, and Shapkin had stayed with him the whole day—thinking and scheming—and deep within himself, Borgov feels as if something is about to change.

He takes a deep breath when she sits before him—and he absolutely does not notice the fact that there is one less empty seat then there was the day before.

The game moves along—less and less pieces remaining on the board. He still cannot quite capture her, her movements are still to fluttering for him to grab onto, but still he plays on.

Black pawn moves to d-five.

A deep, drawn out breath breaks from her after Borgov starts her clock. He can feel her look up at him, her eyes landing on him for the first time since they sat down, but when he lifts his stare to meet hers it is too late—she has moved past him, her gaze pinned onto the ceiling.

Borgov follows her as best he can but there is nothing there for him—only a shadow, un-lit and looming above them like the entrance to an abyss—but when he looks back down into her face he can see it; the light of something other-worldly glowing from within her--from her very soul.

The rest of the room has followed her lead—is staring up, up, up—but Borgov cannot tear his eyes from her, because finally, after all this time, he can see her. The missing pieces from Mexico City, from Paris, have finally fallen into place. No longer is she Beth Harmon the orphan, the child prodigy, the unbalanced woman—now she is what she always should have been, Beth Harmon the champion.

‘ _Liza Harmon._ ’ Borgov thinks, ‘ _My Liza._ ’

And as if she can hear his unspoken thought, she drops her stare back down to him, and with a slow blink of her pale eyelids the game begin anew.

* * *

Six moves later, Borgov, for the first time in his career—the first time in his life—asks for a draw. He knows she has beaten him, can see the moves playing out on the board before him; he knows that to ask for a draw is to beg for mercy in the world they live in, and still he cannot stop himself from looking into her face and asking—despite how certain Borgov is of her answer.

“Draw.”

He can see her considering it, rolling it over in her mind as a wine connoisseur would sample a priceless vintage, and then her lips press gently together—red curls shifting as she shakes her head in the negative.

‘No,’ the shake says, ‘there will be no mercy.’

* * *

Borgov does not play to win after that—instead he merely plays to delay the inevitable, to elongate this game that he has dreamed of playing for so long. She moves with confidence—trapping him at every point—guiding him exactly where she wishes him to go. The crowds muttering is hushed; awed, and when when her king glides to d-four the entire room falls silent.

She hesitates a moment before releasing the king from her grip—eyes darting back and forth across the board to see if there is something she has missed. There isn’t, and when her fingers have finally let go and she looks nervously up into his face—as if she fears that she is about to wake from a dream—Borgov smiles at her; takes his courage with both hands and holds on tight.

“It’s your game.”

His voice, although quiet, booms through the room—it’s echos still resounding even as he takes his king from it’s place, holds it out to her.

“Take it.”

Tears rise in her eyes as the realization sets in; her fingers trembling against his when she reaches out to take his hand—the black king pressed between their palms; digging into their skin. Borgov stands, helps her to her feet amid the uproar, and once she has steadied herself he pulls her to him, his arms holding her tight against his chest, fingers digging into her back, cheek pressing against her right temple.

She trembles, her cheek nestling itself atop Borgov’s shoulder. It lays there so naturally, it is as if they had each been born for this exact moment to exist—the moment between him gripping onto what he knows he cannot have and then letting it go.

He releases her, his stare holding onto hers, and then he sees the truth—that she too can see the pull between them—can feel the unbreakable bond they have formed over the past three years.

* * *

Soon enough—too soon—she is pulled from him, surrounded by reporters with the American agent on one side and the dark haired man on the other. Borgov watches her as she goes, but she does not blur into nonexistence like she had that gloomy day in Mexico City. Instead she remains perfectly clear, even after she is no longer in the room, all the pieces of her sharp and animated.

Luchenko approaches him from the audience, and a serving boy comes up to the table to clear the remnants of their final masterpiece away. Borgov stops him with a touch on the shoulder, reaching for the white queen as he murmurs,

“Not this, this piece is mine.”


End file.
